


Gremlins

by angrywarrior69



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Chakotay makes her laugh, Janeway gets hurt, hurt/comfort?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-05
Packaged: 2018-11-23 17:55:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11407539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angrywarrior69/pseuds/angrywarrior69
Summary: Basically, after watching first scene with KJ in "Live Fast and Prosper" I had an idea. This is my first shared fic ever so...? I clearly know what I'm doing. KJ gets hurt and things are kinda cute is the best summary I got.





	Gremlins

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic but feel free to rip it apart. Not sure what to tag it. Not sure what to title it. But if anyone or their grandmother likes it, I might be encouraged to do a J/C scene that comes after this. I am entirely unsure how to tag or link people but thank you Helen8462 for encouraging me and proof-reading this.

"Computer, activate sonic shower."

Kathryn heard the emitter whir to life as she yawned and inspected her face in the bathroom mirror. She only got as far as touching her cheek when the sonic shower started to emit a high-pitched whine that seemed to only get louder by the second.

"Computer deactivate sonic shower!" Kathryn found herself shouting over the piercing wail.

Nothing changed, the noise grew louder and Kathryn could now feel the floor vibrating beneath her bare feet. Her eardrums began to tremor and she clasped her hands over her ears. She was trying to think of the best way to pry off the access panel at the back of the stall when the mirror over the sink suddenly shattered into a million tiny pieces. "Those are supposed to be shatter-proof," she thought. At least it did half it's job as the tiny fragments remained in the frame. Grateful that she didn't need to worry about clean-up or cutting herself, she noticed that it looked like crumpled tin foil.

Turning her face of Captainly disapproval on the sonic shower she stepped inside to get at the power coupling. She adjusted herself to the sensation of her whole body being vibrated before she moved again. It was a strange feeling, like pins and needles in every inch of muscle. It didn't seem to be dangerous so she went ahead. The moment she removed her hands from her ears to reach for the panel, she regretted it.

The loud and high-pitched sound assaulted her. A sharp pain, deep in her ears made her cry out and stumble backward in the stall. Tears began to swell in her eyes as she flung her pulsating hands back up to the sides of her head. She made a quick maneuver toward the door and evacuated the small space. The movement was fast, uncalculated, and her obscured vision didn't judge the distance correctly. She bumped her shoulder on the side of the stall and her left foot caught on the lip at the bottom. Having already been mid-turn toward the door, her right foot tripped up over her left leg. Instinct took hold of her actions as she felt the spiked panic of being completely thrown off-balance. She jutted her hands out in an attempt to grasp anything to prevent the fall but, her efforts proved to be useless. She hit the deck like a sack of leola root in an instant.

Landing on her side, toes not even an inch away from the traitorous edge, left arm wedged beneath her, the wind was knocked out of her from the impact. Pain contorted on her face and tears slipped from her eyes as she coughed and gasped for breath. The still-screeching shower drowned out the racket of her frenzied attempts to draw air into her lungs. Sore ribs and the shooting pain in her side begged her to stay still but the movement from coughing jostled her. Pain radiated from her shoulder and elbow the more she moved. Through pure determination and power of will the shallow gasps of air became longer and less strained. When she was sure that she could remember how to breathe and move at the same time, she placed her right hand, palm-down, on the deck and blinked away the remaining unshed tears.

Groaning, she motioned to get up and involuntarily cried out again as an intense pain shot up her side from hip to rib before she collapsed back on the floor. A few deep breaths later her brain began working through the pain. Her aching ears came into the forefront of her thoughts and she curled into herself on the floor clasping her hands tightly over her ears. The direct contact with the vibrating surface made the pain in her side almost unbearable but she didn't want move just yet because she'd either have to push off of her damaged arm or her damaged side. The pain in her ears was beginning to have a mind of it's own and she couldn't think straight.

She lay like that for a minute, breathing as calmly as she could and letting her tears fall so that the pain would subside and she could crawl away, when suddenly the shower powered down. The vibrating stopped and the perilously loud high-pitched whine was replaced by an after-echo that Kathryn knew was only ringing in her ears.

Relieved, she removed her hands from her head and sighed only to become alarmed again. She couldn't hear herself over the fading whine. She stuck her right index finger in her ear and wiggled it around, knowing that it was a silly thing to do but, still hoping that it would pop things back into place. Nothing. She slapped her open palm against the floor and then curled it into a fist, frustrated by the absence of sound. She hoped the Doctor would be able to fix this so that she didn't need to postpone her plans to barge into engineering demanding to know what the hell was going on.

With a mute groan, she pried herself off the floor with her uninjured arm and slid into a sitting position against the bulkhead. She inspected her arm first. It hurt like hell but wasn't broken. All the bones under her reddening skin were intact. When she tried to lift it to test out her shoulder she found, painfully, that she couldn't raise her elbow any higher than her heart and slowly lowered the arm back down with the help of her right hand. Next she opened her floor-length white robe and shimmied up her pink night gown to inspect her hip. The skin around it was already turning shades of yellow and purple. She pressed down on the bone and gasped from the pain but was relieved to find that everything was where it was supposed to be. The high-pitched ringing decrescendoed to nothingness as she angrily wiped the fallen tears from her face in dead silence.

She decided that washing her face was good enough for this hell of a day and conceded defeat to the shower. With the help of the toilet, the wall, and a tightly-clenched jaw she got herself standing. Testing out her injured hip, she took a couple steps and found that limping would be her method of transportation. Confoundedly she stared at the sink she's used a million times before and watched the water pour in silence. Forgetting about the state of the mirror she glanced up at it. Seeing only a distorted pale blob of her reflection on a dark background, she hoped her eardrums were in better shape. Figuring that fixing all the damage done to herself would require more than a house-call from the EMH and that this wasn't exactly an emergency, she decided to get dressed. There was no way in hell she was going to sickbay in her pajamas.

When she finished washing up, she went to put her uniform on. The journey to her bedroom was slow and she had to stop twice on the way to try to mentally subdue the pain before she got moving again. Once at the foot of her bed, removing the robe and nightie was simple enough. Shucking the shoulders off, she let silky material slide down her body before she stepped out of it. She took the opportunity to inspect her ribs. Red and yellow blotches spread out, thankfully, none of them were broken, but she found it more difficult to breathe than usual. She sighed once, and then again when she couldn't hear the first one, and then she groaned. This was not how she wanted to start her morning. 

She grabbed her uniform and began gingerly putting it on. Her left arm was non-cooperative and every time she bent, twisted, or turned, her hip and ribs sent stinging pain through her side. Only when she went to pin her combadge onto her uniform did she realize that if anyone tried to contact her, she wouldn't hear them. 

"Damn," she thought. It would take a couple hours to set up visual interfaces in her quarters or ready room or the bridge. She stopped herself from that line of thought right there though, as she was determined not to be deaf forever. Remembering her make-up in the bathroom, she made the short trek there and back again. Some of the stiffness abated at this point and she could now move in a motion more similar to walking than hobbling. The small hand-held mirror her sister had made for her finally got some use after spending years at the bottom of a Starfleet-issue drawer as she applied her make-up.

Once she finished that task, she got halfway through asking the computer what time it was before she rolled her eyes and went to her desk computer to check. She had an hour before she had to be on duty so she decided to replicate a cup of coffee and go over some last minute reports before she went to sickbay. One report turned into two, then three, then four. The cups of coffee followed suit. She was standing facing the viewport in the living area, having stopped mid-pace to think about the variables of an equation when she felt a rush of air go by her legs. She turned to the door and was not expecting the sight before her. 

Her first officer stood in the doorway with the most confused look on his face Kathryn had ever seen. She turned completely toward him, her face serious and questioning but knowing that whatever it was that he was concerned about couldn't be too bad as the alert lights weren't flashing. He said something she couldn't make out and stepped far enough inside her quarters that the door could close. 'Shit,' she thought as she realized talking might not be so easy. Not being able to hear was one problem, not knowing if she would sound normal or not was another. She had already embarrassed herself once today by falling like a clutz and had no intention of prolonging that humiliation. He said something else that, to her, looked like 'Kathryn are you alright?' A line she'd heard from his lips a million times before, usually an annoyance to her. She nodded and held up a finger to him, deciding to forego talking while she wrote down on the padd what had happened. She only got a few words down when Chakotay grabbed her wrist and shook it a little bit, she immediately looked back up at him. 

She knew that he was talking and judging by the intensity in his eyes he was maybe even shouting. Looking at his lips to try and decipher what he was saying became increasingly difficult. The look of absolute concern on his face threw her off and made her forget everything else for a moment. He stopped talking and Kathryn decided to make the attempt at talking without yelling, whispering, or otherwise sounding strange.

His name was a familiar enough thing to roll off her tongue and he relaxed his stance just barely enough that she could pull her wrist back. Then she said that she was fine and to keep the rest of her message dead simple she said "The sonic shower, I'm deaf." She gestured to the bathroom with her left arm, forgetting that she fell on it earlier and gasped. She didn't know how loud it was but as she withdrew her arm to hold it, Chakotay's face was back in hers, all concern again. She was pretty sure he just said 'Kathryn' this time in a concerned and questioning voice. 

This time when she held out a finger and began typing on the padd he didn't disturb her, though she was certain she saw him shuffle on his feet out of the corner of her eye. She knew she'd have to write something out for the Doctor anyway. She handed the padd to him and watched as none of the concern on his face faded away.

~ The sonic shower overloaded this morning and I went inside to shut it off when I tripped. Hurt my left arm, ribs, and hip. Can't hear anything. ~

Chakotay typed something in and handed the padd back to her.

~I hailed you multiple times, sorry for using the emergency override. Your alarm was still on when I came in. Let's get you to sickbay.~

"I am perfectly capable, Commander." She wished she knew if she sounded remotely normal.

Chakotay gave a little dimpled smirk and he motioned for her to give him the padd back. He typed and handed it back to her.

~What if a crew member tries to talk to you? Can't have you yelling at everyone.~ 

"Am I yelling?" She really wasn't sure, but judging by the fact that Chakotay was practically crying from using every last ounce of effort not to laugh hysterically, she got the point.

"Alright Commander, lets go." She hoped she sounded annoyed as she motioned him to the door with her good arm.

 

As they walked to sickbay they had a very slow conversation over the padd about ship-wide malfunctions. Kathryn tried not to limp and make sure she wasn't breathing heavy or making any other sort of pained noises but knew she failed when Chakotay handed the padd back to her and it said,

~Want me to carry you?~

She smirked and slapped his arm just before Seven appeared out of nowhere and began talking to the command duo. She didn't get very far into whatever it was when it looked like Chakotay interrupted her, explained what was going on, and sent her on her way. Seven offered a strange look that may have been borgly-compassion and nodded to the Captain before departing. Kathryn typed in a short message before handing the padd to Chakotay.

~Proficiency report?~

Chakotay laughed and Kathryn noticed how she could feel it reverberate inside herself. She took a mental note to see if that still happens when she gets her hearing back.

Once inside sickbay, the bustling EMH immediately stopped the plethora of tasks before him and began addressing the Captain. She saw Chakotay put his hand up and then bring it down to his hip while he talked, when she looked back to the EMH and he was already scanning her. The Doctor said something and walked away to his medical equipment. Kathryn felt tugging on her sleeve and looked over to see Chakotay gesturing toward a biobed. Understanding the message, she walked over to it but stopped at the side of it when the realization came that she'd need help getting up. If it had only been her arm that was hurting she could easily lift herself with the other one but, with her whole side stiff and uncooperative she was picturing herself falling off and hitting the deck for the second time today.

As if anticipating her needs, Chakotay put his hand on her uninjured shoulder and when she turned to face him, he quickly put his hands under her armpits and lifted her onto the biobed like she weighed nothing. The motion startled her and she gasped in surprise. The slight upward tug on Chakotay's lips told her it was a noise he'd never heard before and she quickly wiped the surprised look off her face and replaced it with an unamused frown and defiant eyes. He either didn't notice or pretended not to notice the look he was receiving and quickly typed a message out on the padd.

~You need minor surgery on your eardrums. 15 minute procedure, you have to be sedated.~ 

Kathryn groaned before typing out her orders for him.

~Find the gremlins, if I'm not in engineering in half an hour, call and make sure the doc didn't botch the surgery.~

Chakotay chuckled and nodded before giving an over-exaggerated old-fashioned salute. The defiant mask slipped at his silliness and she smiled and slapped him on the arm again as the Doctor came over with a tray of medical supplies. Chakotay offered the padd to the Doctor but the EMH simply picked up his own from the tray of supplies he brought over, looking very pleased with himself. Chakotay tapped the object in his palm lightly, smiled, and gave a curt nod to Kathryn before he left. The EMH handed his padd to Kathryn.

~My Dearest Captain,~

Kathryn rolled her eyes and tried not to laugh or groan about how ridiculously dramatic the holographic man could be.

~I'm terribly sorry about what happened to you this morning. Although I wish you'd have come to me sooner, this is an easy fix. I'm going to sedate you and do the surgery first. Then, I'll fix your other injuries while I have you under. Please lie down.

Sincerely, your beloved EMH~

Kathryn glanced up at the Doctor bemusedly as she handed the padd back to him before letting him help her swing her bum leg onto the biobed. Settling down with another inaudible sigh she watched from the corner of her eye as the Doctor raised the hypospray to her neck and her world went dark.


End file.
